Madeleine Murder

by Sandi Scott

  Ryan cleared his throat, and Detective Luna added, “Why don’t the two of you come back to my office where we can talk more privately?”

  “Thanks,” Ryan said.

  Detective Luna led them through the hallway down to a small windowless office with a desk fan purring as it turned back and forth. He switched it off, and the room immediately seemed to go up about ten degrees in temperature.

  “Well, spit it out,” Detective Luna said, dropping down into a well-worn seat. He waved toward a pair of stacking chairs on the other side of his desk. “Have a seat.”

  The two of them sat, with Dizzy sitting attentively and obediently between them.

  Ashley took a breath and tried to let her head clear. The heart of the matter was that someone had been murdered—and that all three of them wanted the murderer to be found. The fact that she was never going to like Detective Luna (or vice versa) didn’t really make a difference.

  Sparrow Soulbrother had been killed, and he deserved justice, even if he was a slimy thief. And she deserved to get her money back, both from Sparrow and from Betty.

  It would work out.

  “Detective Luna, has there been any progress on the murder case?”

  He sighed and shook his head. “Nothing significant that I can tell you about.”

  “We think we have information on someone who may have had.” She looked at Ryan, who nodded in encouragement, and she continued, “Someone with a possible motive to kill Sparrow Soulbrother.”

  “Sparrow Soulbrother?” Detective Luna asked. He frowned at his desk, then moved some papers around until he found a photo of Sparrow Soulbrother underneath some reports. He flipped it over and read something off the back. “That’s right, that’s the name that Gary Johnson was going by.”

  Ashley gulped. “Gary… Johnson?”

  “Yes, Ms. Adams. That was his legal name. The other was just an alias. He had others, but that’s the one he used ’round here. Now, who’s this person that might have had a motive to kill Mr. Johnson?”

  Everything seemed to fall into place. The hair on Ashley’s arms stood on end. For a moment, it felt like she was going to pass out. Everything in the room seemed impossibly distant and filled with echoes. She shook her head.

  “Sorry, but… that was more than a little bit shocking to hear. I certainly wasn’t expecting it. Detective Luna, there was a woman at the bonfire that night when Sparrow—sorry, Mr. Johnson—was killed. She got in a fight with Mr. Johnson’s girlfriend, Moonbeam, and threatened to hurt her.”

  “We heard about that,” Detective Luna said. “Unfortunately, Ms. Pluck—” When Detective Luna saw the blank looks on their faces, he added, “Ms. Jennifer Pluck, also known as ‘Moonbeam,’ was unable to identify who the woman was, other than an old flame of Mr. Johnson’s.”

  Ashley blinked. “Wait… Moonbeam told me that the police had told her that Sparrow, um, Mr. Johnson had an entire second family.”

  “Yes, Ms. Adams, she was told that,” Detective Luna said. “I’m not sure what that has to do with the case.”

  “The woman at the bonfire was Mrs. Johnson. Mrs. Sheila Johnson. The mother of one of the other volunteers—Ryan recognized her.” Ashley suddenly realized something else important. “And I saw Sparrow with her, his ex-wife that is, in the karaoke tent before the fight at the bonfire. Maybe that’s why Moonbeam left crying—not because she couldn’t get the nerve to sing.”

  Detective Luna had been fiddling with a pen. He put it on his desk, then said calmly, “Explain, please.”

  The two of them repeated what had happened earlier this evening—walking next to Coyote’s new house, seeing Sheila on the porch, Ryan recognizing her.

  The three of them stared at each other for a moment.

  Ashley said excitedly, “Sheila told me that her husband was bad news, but that she’d take him back if she had the chance. But she added ‘not in this lifetime’ which seemed cryptic, but totally makes sense if she had killed Sparrow two days previous. Maybe that’s why she came to Seagrass—looking for Sparrow. Then, when she found him, with a girlfriend, she got so angry she killed him.

  “A classic crime of passion,” Ryan said.

  “And where do you think she is now?” Detective Luna said.

  Ashley gave him the address. “Please hurry, Detective. When we passed by the house, I think she knew something was up from the way she was looking at Ryan.”

  “Do you have any reason to believe that she’s dangerous?”

  “Not unless she beat up Moonbeam and then killed her husband a few days ago,” said Ashley.

  Detective Luna escorted them from his office, leaving them standing in front of the building without a way to get back home quickly—certainly they wouldn’t get back in time to see what happened at Coyote’s house.

  Fortunately, Patty pulled up in her van just as three squad cars left, lights flashing, from the back parking lot.

  Ashley helped Dizzy climb inside, then pulled the sliding door shut after her. Ryan climbed into the front seat.

  Patty whistled. “Let me guess. There was another development since you called me.”

  “Hurry! Drive back to my house and I’ll explain.” Ashley said urgently.

  * * *

  When they arrived, the officers were surrounding Coyote’s house. Patty parked haphazardly in Ashley’s driveway; then along with Dizzy, they all piled out of the van and ran into the street behind the police cars.

  Detective Luna looked over his shoulder at them for a moment, then turned around and knocked on the door, asking for Ms. Sheila Johnson to open up. Finally, the door swung inward and Sheila appeared, looking tired and depressed. She had black streaks running down her cheeks from crying. She looked over Detective Luna’s shoulder and locked eyes with Ashley, as if to say, This is all your fault.

  Ashley chewed on the inside of her cheek. Ryan put his arm around her waist and pulled her close as Dizzy butted her head against Ashley’s hand.

  “Mrs. Sheila Johnson?” Ashley saw the brief nod of Sheila’s head and heard Detective Luna continue that Sheila needed to come down to the station to answer some questions about a possible assault charge. Heartsick, Ashley closed her eyes for a moment.

  Detective Luna and the other officers led her down the porch steps to one of the squad cars. Sheila gave a little hiccupping cry as she reached the sidewalk, and Dizzy’s ears pricked up. She pulled away from Ashley, who grabbed for the leash as it slid out of her hand and missed.

  Dizzy ran toward Sheila but was shooed away by one of the officers. She swerved and ran behind the car in the parking lot, an older-model Toyota. She shook herself, then started sniffing the car’s trunk, running back and forth. Finally, she whined, sat up on her back heels, and started scratching the trunk.

  “Oh, no,” Ashley said. She slipped out of Ryan’s arms and walked over to the car. “Dizzy! Here, girl. Don’t bother them now, all right?”

  But Dizzy refused to move. Ashley picked up her leash and pulled her far enough away from the car so that she at least couldn’t scratch at the trunk. Her face was burning with embarrassment. Dizzy tugged at her leash, trying to get back to the car.

  Detective Luna cleared his throat and said, “Anderson, look at that trunk.”

  One of the officers walked over to the trunk of the car. “I don’t see anything, boss.”

  “Open it up.”

  There was a short delay as Sheila’s keys were located in her purse, back in the house. Dizzy continued to pull on the leash, straining to get at whatever was in the trunk.

  Ashley looked over at Sheila, sitting in the back of one of the squad cars. Slumped over in her seat, she didn’t even seem to care about what was happening to her—or whatever was in the trunk of her car. The door was open, but she made no effort to get out.

  The officer unlocked the trunk, letting it pop up without catching it with his hand. He didn’t want to leave any extra fingerprints.

  Ashley stood on tiptoe, peering to see w
hat was in the trunk.

  Inside was a heavy tire iron, well cleaned.

  18

  “Don’t touch that,” Detective Luna said. “We’ll still probably be able to get any bloodstains off it.”

  “But it’s been cleaned,” the officer said.

  “That’s right,” Detective Luna said patiently. “People often think they’ve cleaned up after themselves well enough when they haven’t.”

  Next to the tire iron in the trunk was a wheeled suitcase.

  “Looks like she was planning to leave,” Ashley said softly to Ryan, who had come up beside her. “Like she was getting ready to disappear forever.”

  “After having killed her ex-husband, Coyote’s father,” Ryan said.

  “Something about this isn’t right.”

  “What’s that?”

  She shook her head. She couldn’t quite get a grip on what was bothering her. Sheila had seemed genuine in her love for Sparrow when the two of them had eaten cookies together on the front porch. But was she the kind of woman who could kill?

  There was something she was missing. Something she had to remember—before it was too late.

  Tires screeched on the road, and a white SUV stopped in the middle of the street. The driver’s-side door popped open, and Coyote jumped out. He was running toward the officers, saying, “Why is my mom in the car? What are you doing with my mom?”

  Detective Luna swung away from the trunk of the car toward Coyote and caught him before he could reach the squad car. Detective Luna spoke in an undertone to him, and Ashley strained to hear what he was saying.

  Suddenly, Coyote shouted, “She didn’t kill Sparrow Soulbrother! What are you talking about? That’s crazy! It was that old coot from the crawdad food truck! I saw her yelling at him out on the beach!”

  Detective Luna kept talking, and Coyote began shaking his head rapidly. “No, no, no, no…”

  Dizzy, sensing Ashley’s distraction, yanked on the leash.

  “Dizzy!” Ashley exclaimed. Now she was going to be in trouble—Dizzy was going to go right for the trunk and drool on the tire iron.

  Instead, she ran for Coyote. When Detective Luna shooed her away, she ran toward Coyote’s SUV instead and climbed inside.

  Oh, no. Now she wanted to go for a ride with Coyote!

  Ashley and Ryan were already jogging toward the SUV. “Dizzy! You terrible, terrible mutt!” Ashley said to herself. “This time, you’ve gone too far. We’re going to get arrested for this!”

  Ashley reached the SUV only to find Dizzy sitting proudly in the passenger seat. She had something in her mouth that she tucked in between her front paws, something small and fuzzy. Ashley gasped as she realized where she had last seen that small fuzzy doglike object, and all the pieces of the puzzle of Sparrow Soulbrother’s murder finally fell into place.

  “What’s that?” Ryan said, reaching out for it.

  Ashley grabbed his arm. “Don’t touch that—it explains everything.”

  He froze, then slowly turned his head to look at her.

  “What is it?”

  Her mind was buzzing, making connections. “That’s the stuffed animal I saw in Sparrow Soulbrother’s vendor tent at the festival. It was holding his wireless debit machine. And now it’s here—in Coyote’s car.”

  Ryan shook his head and said, “Detective Luna? Could you come here a moment?”

  Detective Luna looked at them, then at Coyote, then at the back of Sheila’s head as she sat in the squad car. He said something to one of the officers, who nodded, pulled a notebook out of his pocket, and walked up to Coyote, probably with the intention of taking a statement.

  Coyote seemed oblivious. He was standing on tiptoe, clearly more worried about his mom than anything else.

  “Are you all right, Miss Adams?” Detective Luna said.

  She pointed into the SUV, at the stuffed coyote sitting between Dizzy’s legs. “I apologize for Dizzy, Detective, but she’s found an important clue. That stuffed animal was one that Sparrow Soulbrother was using to hold his debit machine during the festival, but now Coyote has it.”

  Detective Luna stared thoughtfully at her for a long moment. “I’m not following.”

  Before she could stop herself, Ashley blurted out, “Moonbeam told me that whoever killed Sparrow was a planner—they had deliberately slashed Sparrow’s tires to lure him to the van. That doesn’t seem to fit the narrative of a crime of passion. Neither does stealing a stuffed animal from the victim.”

  Detective Luna thought over what she had said, then turned slowly on his heel and walked back toward Coyote. Every step seemed to echo down the street.

  Detective Luna reached Coyote, who was still talking to the officer and giving his statement. Detective Luna put a hand on his shoulder.

  Ashley squeezed her eyes shut, then forced them back open. She wanted to turn around and walk back to the house, and yet she couldn’t force herself to take a single step, either forward or backward. Ryan took her hand and squeezed it.

  “Son,” Detective Luna said. “I think you need to come with me to the police station. “There are some details that need to be cleared up.”

  “What?”

  “Son, there’s some physical evidence that’s been found in your car. I’m sure there’s an innocent explanation for it, you just need to come down to the station and tell it to us.” Nothing in Luna’s voice said that he believed there was an innocent explanation for it.

  Coyote shouted, “How can you do this? This is ridiculous! First my mother, and now me… this is crazy!”

  Dizzy barked a question, then jumped down out of the SUV and came over next to Ashley. She put her nose into Ashley’s hand.

  Ashley bent down and picked up Dizzy’s leash. Dizzy led her gently toward Coyote and Detective Luna, who were talking loudly back and forth.

  “I mean, come on! What proof do you even have that either of us was involved?”

  Detective Luna said, “Miss Adams has pointed out some interesting facts that need an explanation. I don’t have any obligation to explain anything other than to say that you need to come down to the station or I’ll have reason to put you under arrest for obstructing the investigation of the murder of one Gary Johnson. I generally leave the explaining to the lawyers.”

  “Miss Adams?” Coyote said, looking around wildly like he was expecting someone else to pop out of the bushes or something. “Who is that?”

  “It’s me,” Ashley said.

  “Why would you accuse me of such a terrible thing?”

  “Because Gary Johnson was your father and probably the man who stole your identity, ruining your plans to buy a house.”

  “That’s….what does that have to do….no!” Coyote’s shoulders slumped forward.

  By now, Coyote’s mother had walked over to see what was going on. Coyote looked up at her, made eye contact, and then started talking. Almost in a whisper.

  “He was a deadbeat. It was bad enough that I had to grow up without him, but then just when I start building a life for myself, he had to screw that up too. I didn’t mean to kill him. I just wanted to talk.”

  “Coyote…stop.” Shelia begged her son for silence. But Coyote raised up his palm, signaling to her that it was over. He continued.

  “I wanted to move to Seagrass because I know that he comes to Seagrass Days each year. I figured I’d at least get three days a year with him—I know it sounds silly, but it was enough for me. But as the banker was explaining to me the most likely suspect for the identify thief, all these bells were going off: someone who has access to my personal information and records—check; someone who might be desperate for money—check; someone who had a history of dubious morals—check. In my heart, I knew it was him. So I tried to ask him about it, but he was avoiding me the days up to the festival. I figured I could slash his tire and then offer to help him change it; that would at least give us some time together to talk.

  “Oh, Coyote, honey.” Sheila was hugging herself, tears f
alling down her cheeks.

  “When I asked him about it, he confessed but showed no remorse. He told me that I’d understand why he did one day, and probably do something similar eventually, being of the Johnson bloodline and all. That made me so angry—what does he know about me anyway?

  “Is that when you killed him?” asked Detective Luna.

  Coyote looked up at him, almost looking shocked to hear someone say the words. Killed him. He started talking so quietly, that Detective Luna had to ask him to speak up.

  “No,” Coyote said. “I asked him how he dared to pretend to know someone he never bothered to make an effort to know. He went on about how he knew me better than anyone—he was my father. He said even though he was never around he did think of me all the time. Like that makes any difference! He tossed me that stupid stuffed animal to prove it. ‘Got that for you a while back’ he said. ‘Been meaning to give it to you.’” Coyote narrowed his eyes in anger. “Something about that ugly coyote stuffed animal made me think of myself as a little boy wishing I had a dad around, and I guess all those years of anger just came out at once.”

  Sheila was sobbing by now. “I’m so sorry, Coyote.”

  “I’m the one who is sorry, Mom. Like you said, there’s always something worth loving in everyone. I just couldn’t see it in him—I was so angry.”

  Ashley wanted to tell him to stop talking. But he had murdered his father.

  There’s always a better way, she thought. She glanced quickly in Ryan’s direction. He looked devastated.

  “I just wanted to get on with my life!” Coyote shouted. It echoed down the street. “That man… he wasn’t my father. He was just some ghost that kept haunting me and my mom and screwing us over. Our lives will be better with him gone.”

  Detective Luna raised his eyebrows at the officer who’d been taking notes, then nodded. The officer had taken his phone out and aimed it at Coyote. He must have recorded the whole confession. With a few short jabs of his finger, the officer saved the recording and sent it onward.

  Ashley heard the phone in Detective Luna’s pocket buzz twice and realized that the officer must have sent it direct to the detective’s phone.